June 26, 2025 (Cape Cod, MA) – The Arts Foundation of Cape Cod is excited to announce that it is investing $107,130 to support 31 creative projects across the region.
“Despite the loss of our National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) grant in May, we have been able to tap into local sources of funding to ensure we can support meaningful projects that add joy, strengthen community, bolster the economy, and showcase the power the arts have in addressing important issues, including health and wellness, housing, and the environment,” said Arts Foundation Executive Director Julie Wake. “We continue to be inspired by the ways in which the sector uses the arts as a force for good and a catalyst for positive change.”
This is now the third straight year the Arts Foundation has granted out more than $100,000 to support arts and culture in the region. Over the past five years, it has invested more than $750,000 in strengthening the Cape’s creative economy. This includes nearly $170,000 in NEA funding that it has distributed locally.
Last November, the Arts Foundation was awarded its third NEA grant since 2021, funding it planned to match and distribute this month. In May, the NEA rescinded that $40,000 grant in an email, writing that it did not align with President Donald J. Trump’s new policy priorities.
The Arts Foundation was able to fill the gap in federal funding through several generous donors as well as support from the Cape Cod Foundation. That support allowed it to grant out $64,000 to 18 organizations and $43,130 to 13 artists. It received a total of 89 applications seeking $625,000 in funding.
Among the projects being funded is the Provincetown Theater’s Act Three which will be supported through a $5,000 Arts Foundation grant. Launched this spring, the theatre enrichment program gives adults over the age of 60 who live on the Outer Cape a space to express themselves creatively onstage, culminating in a performance at the end of the 8-week course.
“It brings people in the community together and gets them out of their homes and out of isolation,” said the theater’s Managing Director Gary Garrison. “With this grant, we can now grow this program and figure out what part two and part three are about, and it lets us dream about parts four and five and how we can improve this and make it stronger. This is such a vote of confidence, and we can now turn this into something that is recurring.”
Among the artists to receive a grant is Osterville’s Dawn McKenzie whose Gimme Shelter project will be exhibited at the Cultural Center of Cape Cod, starting July 25th, and will explore the impact housing instability has on our neighbors. “I was shocked because I have never applied for a grant before,” McKenzie said when she was notified she had been awarded $3,000 in support of her project. “I really want the general population on Cape Cod to connect to what is happening in people’s lives so that those who are invisible to them suddenly become visible. …Sometimes people respond to art in ways they don’t respond to an issue just by reading a newspaper article. I’m trying to make our housing issue more visible, but in a digestible format.”
She was hopeful that individuals experiencing housing instability will have an opportunity to see the exhibit “and feel welcomed,” she said. “I want people who are being affected by the housing crisis – families and individuals – I’d like them to realize they are being seen and they are not invisible.”
The other artists who received grants from the Arts Foundation are:
- Joe Diggs of Osterville ($8,000) — An artist residency program in Osterville.
- Janet Fitzgerald of Harwich ($2,500) — A fiber art exhibit that will feature live demonstrations to educate and engage the public in the diverse range of fiber art forms, including rug braiding, weaving, spinning, felting, quilting, and more.
- Dawna Hammers of Falmouth ($3,000) — A video documentary that demonstrates the healing power of music therapy for individuals living with dementia and Alzheimer’s.
- Samuel Holmstock of Barnstable ($3,500) — Drumming for Recovery, a therapeutic drumming class for adults living with a Substance Use Disorder (SUD), in partnership with WellStrong in East Falmouth.
- Andre Lima of Orleans ($1,000) — Free weekly capoeira classes offered at Nauset Fit Co. in Orleans by Capoeira Besouro Cape Cod.
- Patrick Riviere of Provincetown ($5,000) — The actor, playwright, and filmmaker will adapt his stage play into a short film, “Remembering When I Used to Remember.” The piece places a spotlight on the memory-loss community, offering empathy, care, and compassion for individuals living with dementia as well as their loved ones and caregivers.
- Shannon Ross of Nantucket ($2,000) — A community cookbook, “Around Our Table,” that features a series of published columns and which aims to document, preserve, and celebrate Nantucket residents, their stories, and their family recipes.
- Laura Shabott of Provincetown ($2,500) —Lee and Tennessee, a live performance at the Cape Cod Museum of Art that will meld theater with visual art featuring Shabott as Lee Krasner and actors John Dennis Anderson and Luke Bosco performing “Something Cloudy, Something Clear.”
- Cody Sullivan of Provincetown ($5,000) — Cody Plays, free hyper-local, one-act plays written in the span of a few days for and about guests who are a part of the Outer Cape community. Performances are held at the Wilde Theater at the Gifford House weekly in the summer and monthly in the off-season.
- Lauren Wolk-Hall of Centerville ($4,500) — The InkLine Project is a series of short, animated films created by author Lauren Wolk-Hall and visual artist Jackie Reeves. Each piece explores themes of identity, resilience, and resistance using creativity as an act of expression and survival.
- Rachel Youngling of West Yarmouth ($3,130) — Musical Discoveries, a music enrichment program for children and families being served by the Enoch Cobb Early Learning Center in Barnstable.
Along with the Provincetown Theater, the organizations that received grants from the Arts Foundation are:
- The Awareness Project in Sandwich ($1,500) — Music, puppet theater, and mindfulness workshops for older adults or individuals with disabilities.
- Cahoon Museum of American Art in Cotuit ($2,000) — Creative Encounters, a seasonal artist-centered series, taking place from spring through winter 2025, that includes free and low-cost artist talks, interactive demonstrations, and museum-wide open houses to reduce barriers to participating and accessing the arts.
- Cape Cod Chamber Music Festival in North Eastham ($1,500) — A free community concert on July 29th at the Federated Church of Hyannis featuring Genghis Barbie, an all-female French horn quartet.
- Cape Cod Museum of Art in Dennis ($5,000) — The 2026 Cape Cod Open Sculpture Invitational, opening on April 16, 2026, that is free and open to the public and will feature pieces created by 35 sculptors.
- Cape Cod Theatre Company/Harwich Junior Theatre ($8,000) — A school matinee project that will welcome over 2,000 local students in kindergarten through 12th grade to see live theatrical performances followed by talkbacks with cast, crew, musicians, and production staff.
- College Light Opera Company in Falmouth ($3,500) — Five free summer community shows in June, July, and August that take place outside the Falmouth Public Library as well as the West Falmouth Library. Performances include ones tied to the Juneteenth holiday as well as the 4th of July celebration.
- Eventide Arts in Dennis ($4,000) — A production of “You’re a Good Man Charlie Brown” in November 2025 that will feature children and adults living with disabilities in partnership with Esprit, a Centerville-based nonprofit.
- Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown ($2,500) — A project to implement year-round accessibility measures to ensure artists and guests with differing abilities can access free public events.
- Historic Highfield in Falmouth ($2,500) — A return of a juried art show that came to Highfield Hall in 2018, Trailblazers: Celebrating Contemporary Japanese Prints, which will bring over 136 contemporary prints (woodblock, intaglio, lithography, etching, aquatint, silkscreen, and contemporary digital innovations) created by over 100 Japanese printmakers, from June 21st to October 26th. The exhibit will feature workshops and presentations on Japanese music, cuisine, visual arts, wellness practices, children’s activities, and more.
- Monomoy Regional High School in Harwich ($10,000) — The SparkRoom, a vibrant, school-based makerspace where students in 8th through 12th grade collaborate with local artists and makers, exploring apparel design, digital arts, printmaking, prototyping, and more.
- Mashpee Public Schools ($2,000) — A two-day artist-in-residence program in which Alex Torres & His Latin Orchestra teach students at Mashpee Middle-High School one day and perform for them the next.
- Orleans Cultural District ($3,500) — A series of public concerts, Pop-Up Practices, featuring local musicians who perform free shows in downtown Orleans every Saturday in the fall of 2025 and spring of 2026.
- Provincetown Commons ($4,500) — From the Earth, a series of six workshops which guide participants in foraging, ink and paper making, creating woven objects, and quiet observations of the fragile ecosystems that surround us.
- Truro Center for the Arts at Castle Hill ($2,500) — 19th Annual Provincetown Dance Festival which will take place Friday, August 22nd through Saturday, August 23rd, bringing together over 60 artists and companies from throughout the world to perform a variety of dance forms, including Flamenco, Chinese, hip-hop, ballet, contemporary, classical Indian, Irish dance, ballroom, jazz, and more.
- Twenty Summers in Provincetown ($2,000) — The nonprofit’s 12th season which features an eclectic series of more than 30 cultural events, ranging from intimate live concerts to readings to artist talks to curated walks.
- Vinegrass Corporation in Orleans ($2,000) — The 11th Annual Vinegrass Music Festival which will take place on Sunday, October 5th at Truro Vineyards and will feature over 30 musicians performing a range of American roots music.
Founded in 1987, the Arts Foundation has been distributing grants to invest in all of the arts for the past 36 years, serving as its longest running program.